Montgomery County Community College honors former Montgomery Publishing Company president with Hall of Fame induction

These are all words that could be used to describe William E. Strasburg, the man who was recently accepted into the Montgomery County Community College Hall of Fame. A founding trustee and past foundation board chairman for the school, Strasburg was also named an honorary alumnus by the school.

Now 86, he sat down to recall some of the highlights from his illustrious career, including his time as the president of Montgomery Publishing Co. — now Montgomery Media — which owns The Ambler Gazette, and his conversation with President John F. Kennedy about the then escalating conflict in Vietnam.

After enlisting in the Navy at age 17 and serving with the Atlantic Fleet during World War II, Strasburg left the Navy in 1946 to begin studying at Ohio Wesleyan College.

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He soon became president of the student body and it was there that he met his future wife, Sylvia. By 1950, he earned a bachelor’s degree and began working for the International News Service in Washington, D.C.

As a reporter for INS, he traveled all over the world, including a beat in Africa, where he filed stories on education, and in Washington, where he covered the Pentagon during the Korean War.

By 1951, he and Sylvia were living in Washington and he was covering the MacArthur Hearings. Soon he realized he wanted to focus his efforts on something more personal.

“I was convinced that each one of us has to make our own community in the lives we have,” he said. “I couldn’t do it there but I could in a small newspaper.”

After purchasing The Ambler Gazette from Maurice Haywood in 1952, he worked for the next 37 years as president of the Montgomery Publishing Co.

“The paper began to grow,” he said. “ keeping the people informed in a responsible way.”

He soon became close with the publisher of the Public Spirit, Chester Morris, and the two became business partners. They got word that there was a hearing on the Fort Washington Industrial Park, and Strasburg said he bought an acre of land along Commerce Drive for $12,000.

In 1955, Montgomery Publishing Co. moved into the new building built on that acre of land, where the company has its headquarters today. By 1959, Strasburg purchased the Times Chronicle and the company grew to 300 employees.

The philosophy of the company, he said, was always “what’s truthful has to be factual.”

For his contributions to the industry, Strasburg earned the Pennsylvania Newspaper Association’s Lifetime Achievement Award.

“I felt deeply a sense of ownership of the people,” he said. “I was a custodian to provide them with information. There was a yearning to live in a community with no problems or problems that could be managed. That’s unchanged.”

Strasburg said by 1961 he was sent on a mission by the government to Vietnam to observe the situation in the country, talk to soldiers on the ground and give a report to President Kennedy. Upon his return to the White House, he and Kennedy discussed the situation.

“I told him the escalation in the country would be up to 10,000 men over there,” Strasburg said. “ said, ‘Bill don’t ever repeat that again. That’s not true.’”

Strasburg still has an autographed napkin Kennedy signed for his children hanging in a frame, along with a luncheon menu and invitation, that he’s hung on the inside of his office.

In 1963, Strasburg said the federal government was allowing organizations to make grants to strengthen education. A group came together and met at the Valley Forge Hotel. That group was the first trustees of Montgomery County Community College. Together they helped establish the first core faculty at the school, and in 1964, the college was founded.

“It was designed as a two-year program to further your education in an affordable way,” he said. “Education is central to any kind of progress in the community.”

Strasburg said he served as associate director of the United States Information Agency and was named executive vice president of the Philadelphia Bulletin.

By 1969, after having resigned from the board at MCCC, he said he came back to help create and serve as the first chairman of a new foundation that would provide scholarships and pay for activities at the school.

In 1989, he sold Montgomery Newspapers to Robert Rock, whom he called “one of the smartest persons I’ve ever met. He had a PhD. in business.”

Since that time, he hasn’t slowed down. In 1998, he and Sylvia opened Meadowood Retirement Community, where he lives today.

“I love it,” he said. “It is so important that we social people. You can’t sit in your house and watch television. Here we have everything.”

Strasburg gave special thanks to MCCC for all of its continued recognition of him. As a founding trustee and having seen presidents who have all brought something different to the school, Strasburg said no one has done as much for the faculty and students as current President Karen Stout.

“She has made the college a remarkable experience,” he said.

As for his Hall of Fame award, he was incredibly proud.

“I’m very pleased,” he said. “I appreciate that and I want to help them in any way I can. The college is important.”